no rest for heroes
by Empatheia
Summary: -Ichigo, Ishida- What should soldiers do, who have slept through the end of their war?


**A/N:** Written for the June 2008 round of Bleach flashfic exchanges on LiveJournal. Of all the shit I wrote this month, this is probably the least shitty, but not by very much. Feel free to LIGHT IT ON FIRE if you feel so inclined.

**xxxxx**

_**no rest for heroes**_

**xxxxx**

There was dark red spreading through the fine white material of Ishida's school shirt, rank and warm.

Ichigo couldn't stop staring at it. The ground was grinding into his head, his chest was aflame with an assortment of agonies, his breath already coming shallow and metallic, but all he could see was Ishida. It seemed wrong, somehow, that someone so fastidious should die covered in dirt and his own blood. He should have dissolved in a spray of reiatsu, a shower of radiant white particles. That would have been fitting: just as ridiculous as the rest of his life had been. This was just _wrong_.

They had been on their way to Urahara's shop, ready to pursue Aizen's remaining forces back to Hueco Mundo for the final battle. After that there would still be clean-up to do, countless Hollows and minor Arrancar to deal with, three worlds to restore to their proper order. There was still so much work to do. They didn't have time for this, not now, not when everyone needed them so much.

There were only inches between the positions they'd fallen in. Ichigo could smell Ishida's last breath, sharp and reeking with the onset of death and rot. He had already gone ahead.

Ichigo wondered if he'd have the courtesy to wait, and decided not just before the darkness claimed the last point of light in his eyes.

He died.

xxxxx

When he woke an eternity and a moment later, there was dust in his mouth and his lips were cracked.

He was ravenous, terribly thirsty, and in pain easily six other ways besides that.

So far there didn't seem to be much difference between this and being alive, which seemed to him to be lame as hell.

The Catholics he knew were convinced there should be harps and golden streets and white clouds and contentment, but he didn't see any of those. The streets of Rukongai were made of packed red dirt, not gold; the sky was clear and a faded, unhappy blue; there definitely weren't any harps. The Buddhists believed he would be reincarnated, but he knew that wouldn't happen for a while yet, unless he died here of starvation. There were other beliefs, other faiths, but none of them had ever described something as boring and uncomfortable as this.

Ichigo sat up and put a hand to his aching head.

"About time, Kurosaki," snapped Ishida.

Well, that was interesting enough to make him pay attention. Ichigo was fairly sure you weren't supposed to wake up next to people one knew. He vividly remembered Chad's bird, or rather the little boy's soul within it, and the new family he'd been forced to make when he reached Soul Society at last. No mothers, no fathers, no brothers or sisters or loved ones or anything one would ever wish to find in the afterlife. Attachments had to be dissolved to make reincarnation less messy. That was how it worked. There were rules.

But then, Ishida wasn't family or a loved one. He was just a comrade. Maybe there were exceptions for that kind of thing?

If so, Ichigo privately thought they were stupid. The bond between comrades and friends was ofttimes just as powerful as that between family and lovers, and though Ishida had always managed to maintain his facade of hating Ichigo, he had fooled no one-- Ichigo least of all. There was a caring between them deeper than many friends and families and lovers ever reached. They'd trusted each other with their lives. They'd failed, of course, but they both knew that was neither of their faults.

It seemed unfair to every other soul who had ever woken up alone that Ichigo should be allowed to wake up beside his friend, who was a pompous idiot who pretended to hate him but had taken the first bullet for him moments before the end.

Why should those poor souls, who did not know this place and would feel terrified and alone and abandoned when brought here suddenly without warning or explanation, be given less than him?

It was unfair, massively so, but he couldn't find it within himself to complain.

xxxxx

Somewhere within himself, Ichigo had actually been relieved when the bullet reached his heart.

He had been so tired of fighting.

Since Rukia, there had been no rest for him, for _any_ of them. First it was her who needed rescuing from her lonely white tower. Then it was Inoue. Then the white tower became Karakura Town and the princess all its innocent residents, and then in the end the entire world and every person in it. Different tower, different enemy, different day but always the same old shit. There was always someone standing in his way to make every step forward a battle to the death; always an obstacle to tangle his hands and feet and heart in. Nothing had been easy since Rukia, but he couldn't even have the comfort of blaming her for that.

When death came for him and for Ishida, by surprise out of a sunny day, his last thought before the darkness claimed him and his first after it lifted had been _now they'll have to let us rest._

How wrong he was.

xxxxx

It took Unohana less than an hour to locate them among the milling, dusty denizens of Rukongai.

She'd been informed of their deaths moments after they actually happened, and had been on her way to pick to them before they even properly arrived.

Ichigo saw her coming and fought the urge to cry. His wound was gone, naturally: damage to the flesh never translated through death into damage to the soul unless there was emotional significance attached to it. His weariness, however, was soul-deep and was not healed. It was his heart that was tired, not his body, and not even death could cure that.

He looked over at Ishida. His face was blank, but his fists where white-knuckled at his sides and every harsh, tense line of his body told Ichigo that he felt much the same.

Unohana regarded them for a moment where they sat filthy and empty-eyed in the dirt at her feet, and reached her hands out to them.

"Come with me," she said gently, and they could hear in her voice that she understood everything they wanted to say but were too proud to. "The beds in my clinic are softer than the road."

xxxxx

Ichigo and Ishida slept.

When they finally awoke nearly two days later, the battle had already ended without them. Heaven itself, not empty after all, had come down to join the battle. The King of Soul Society still held his throne, and all had returned to as it had been.

It seemed terribly anticlimactic.

Where would they fit into this new peace? They had both longed for this, but now that it was here they felt useless and lazy and unnecessary. The worlds were righting themselves without their help. There was nothing for them to do _but_ rest.

What should soldiers do who have slept through the end of their war?

xxxxx

The sun wheeled overhead through a sky that was an unrelentingly perfect blue. There was a sweet little breeze ruffling their hair, and trees ringing the courtyard which shaded them just enough to keep the worst of the heat away. There were no bugs. They had no wounds, there were no terrifying enemies bearing down on them, no ongoing wars to fight and die for. Nobody wanted their help rebuilding as neither of them knew anything about the demon arts required, and Unohana had expressly forbidden that they be sent to Hueco Mundo on Hollow-extermination duty. It was idyllic, exactly the paradise they had wished for.

They had never been so bored in both living and dead memory.

"Kurosaki," said Ishida from where he lay on the grass off to Ichigo's left.

"What?" asked Ichigo muzzily.

"Think fast."

A bolt of brilliant blue energy exploded in the dirt right where Ichigo's hand had been seconds before. He rolled to his feet and stared at Ishida, who was kneeling now with his Quincy bow half-drawn again already. "What the--"

"You may want to shut up and dodge," Ishida interrupted with a wicked smile, and fired again. "Let's settle this once and for all."

Ichigo dodged. Zangetsu had somehow found its way into his hand. Suddenly, he was no longer bored. Ishida had been his first real challenge. It made sense, in a full-circle sort of way, that they should be each other's last opponents.

"If I win, you admit that we're friends," stipulated Ichigo with a grin of his own.

"Done. If I win, you admit that I'm smarter than you."

"I know you're smarter than me. Pick something else."

"...Fine. If I win, you room with me at the Academy."

Ichigo stared at him, then laughed-- free and loud, unburdened by worry or sorrow. "That's totally uneven, you bastard. I'm upping mine. If I win, I get the top bunk."

"That doesn't even make _sense_, Kurosaki. That means if you win, you still room with me-- just on your terms."

"Sounds good to me."

"Then I'm not really winning anything at all, am I? You idiot. If I win, you get the bottom bunk, then."

"Done. Have at thee. Or whatever."

They flew at each other, weapons bright and fighting grins brighter, and instantly felt the rightness of it. Whatever had been wrong to make their idyll so incomplete and unsatisfying was now corrected by the singing rush of joy battle brought them.

Paradise was complete.

**XxxxxX**

**A/N: **All this fluff is making my teeth hurt. My angst!muse needs to stop sleeping with other people and come home already.


End file.
